~ Writing & Coffee. Especially coffee.

How to take a grownup summer holiday. Or not…

After more than three decades of power-parenting, we attended the graduation of our youngest child last month. And we realized—now that we don’t have to book hotels and transport for offspring—we can afford to have a proper, grownup summer holiday at last. Well, kind of…

BARB’S VACATION TO-DO LIST:

1. Book lodging (for my dog):

I’m the least-fussy traveler ever. I can stay anywhere. Okay…anywhere that has wifi. And an en suite because I won’t put on shoes to use the bathroom. And a washing machine, dishwasher, fridge-freezer, and microwave. A patio with a grill. Privacy. Good restaurants, access to museums and culture, outdoor recreation, water, mountains, good transportation, and historical sites. And an electric kettle.

No problem.

And that allows dogs.

Erm…

After much, much, MUCH Tripadvisor, AirBnB, Google, and a few novenas, I found Francisco and Emelia. They live in one half of the mill his family has owned for hundreds of years, and have converted the other half into a little holiday villa in the heart of Spain. At least, I thought so. I couldn’t be sure because they spoke no English and the Spanish I remember from school is pretty much limited to ¿Has visto la pluma de mi tía? On the off-chance that conversational gambits would involve anything other than sightings of the pen of my aunt, I conducted negotiations via Google Translate and booked the mill for July and August. Probably…

2. Book transportation (for my dog):

Any possible savings from travel sans-offspring would have to be sacrificed to pay for the dog’s shots and sparkling new Pet Passport. Plus, obviously, we were going to need her bed, dishes, all her toys, several large bags of food and treats, her blanket, spare blanket, ball-flinger, brush, and poop-bags (lots). I figured my husband and I could each stuff a change of underwear and a toothbrush into our pockets in order to meet airline baggage limits.

“I have a better idea.” My husband was delighted. “We’ll take the Classic and drive to Spain so we’ll have plenty of room for anything we want to bring with.”

Me: “But…should we really take something that measures its age in multiple decades?”

Him: “That’s all good. We know it won’t need a new water pump.” (NOTE: this is called foreshadowing, boys and girls. Pay attention.)

I tried pointing out a few other details, like the fact that the Classic had a steering wheel on the wrong side for European driving, that it was old, that it sucked down fuel like Scots facing last-call at the pub, that it was REALLY old, that it would take several days of driving, and oh by the way—did I mention OLD?

He wandered off muttering about various pieces of sports equipment he could now load into the Classic.

I lit a candle and made sacrifices to the Google-deities, and they came up with the perfect solution—a two-day car-ferry cruise from England to Spain that would accommodate us, the dog, and the Classic. It only cost slightly more than booking lodging and transport for all the offspring, and had one cabin left with an outside view. I was pretty sure I was getting the hang of this grownup holiday thing.

3.Pack:

The Classic is big enough to have its own post code. We didn’t bring the living room sofa, but everything else was fair game. (You never know. They might not have toilet paper in Spain. Or food.)

We’re off! Or not…

The day of our departure arrived and we rose with the dawn. As we were loading the car, the hub noticed that the MOT (safety medallion) would expire before we returned, so he headed off to get it inspected. I went back to bed. When he and the Classic returned several hours and hundreds of ££ later, he explained why this was a good thing. “Now, along with a water pump, we don’t have to worry about the brakes or the exhaust. Or the brand new locking gas cap to replace the one that for some reason was missing when they went to do the inspection.” (So yeah. More foreshadowing. It will be on the final exam.) We finished loading, stopped to buy gas (and collect the gas cap that we’d apparently left with the last fill-up), and we were off!

Featherstone Farm Hotel: a proper bed in Wolverhampton

We drove across Scotland and down through England, passing the Lake District and stopping to spend the night in a four-poster bed at the ancient Featherstone Farm Hotel near the Cotswolds. If anyone can find prettier scenery, they’re welcome to tell me.

(Fellow travellers.) Horses and dogs. In England, they get it…

Next morning we arrived at the ferry dock in Plymouth. They slapped a big sticker on the windshield and asked if our dog was muzzled. Luckily (she did not approve of that muzzle, and had an uncanny ability to rub it off within seconds of its application) they didn’t actually inspect our incompetent muzzling efforts.

To my surprise, I loved the boat. In our little group, I was, however, alone in that opinion. The poor dog was horrified to discover that the bright blue deck surface reserved for her constitutional didn’t have a single blade of grass. Despite all my pleas to “go potty”, she decided to hold it until it could be done properly. For two days. [Memo to self: next time bring a bag of greens. Or maybe astro-turf…]

Meanwhile, the hub headed down to our cabin, made up the bed, and started to work. I went to explore the ship. We left port and soon were merrily bobbing along. Lots of bobbing. In ever-increasing bobs. My fellow passengers began to take on distinctly greenish hues. A group of laughing young men stopped on the stairway in front of me while two of their number puked their little hearts out. I got dinner from one of the onboard restaurants. Yum! Fish and chips. As my food arrived, the couple at the next table covered their mouths and ran off. Soon there was a line along the outside rail.

Isn’t cruising fun?

I took the dog for one last tour of the blue deck so she could again refuse to “go here”. By then the winds were so fierce that I could barely stand, so I admired the sunset briefly and headed back to our cabin. But as I lay in the bed and watched stars from our little window, I thought that I could get used this grown up holiday idea.

Sunset from the (dog) poop-deck

Tomorrow’s post:

I can’t get used to this grown up holiday idea.

I'd LOVE you to share this. Please pick a button. Heck, pick all of them!

“Sucked down fuel like Scots facing last-call at the pub.” Hahaha! Our old Dodge 2500 truck did that. Now we pay as much in payments for a new Dodge truck! I think I could enjoy such a holiday, but I want now worries, so getting a dog sitter is a must for our two.

Well, I can manage without booze but ice is a God-bless-American right and entitlement. When we first moved to England and were getting the kitchen done up, I kept asking the installers about the water line to the fridge for the ice-maker. They had no idea what I was talking about. I saw why when the fridge arrived—not only minus the ice-maker and water in the door, but we even had to order ice-cube trays from Amazon.

I understand that back in the States, there are companies that produce super-clear ice. They charge $1/cube. Seems about right to me.

I do rather miss the freezer, I have to say, but being on my own and eating not so much ( and why my waistline keeps expanding, I’ll never know…) it didn’t seem worth the investment. I’m sort of regretting that at present 🙂

Whew! That was an awesome read Barb. I look forward to the following posts. Love the “poop deck” joke – didn’t even see it coming – Ha! I used to truck to Newfoundland , Canada – a 500 mile wide island that is 100 miles off Canada’s east coast. It was an 8 hour boat ride (now 4 hours with bigger boats) and I can recall days where the “bobbing” got so great that only a few of us regular riders showed up for supper.Holding onto the plates as they slid across the table became somewhat of an art. In the fall and spring when the storms were the worst, there were times that tractor-trailers actually rolled over inside the ship even though they were chained down. They would be dragged off on their sides as there wasn’t room to right them inside the ship.

I always loved that trip or boat trips in general. I was lucky and rarely got sea sick no matter how rough it got. It was funny, because who got sick and who didn’t seemed completely random – you would see (as you mentioned) young strong men barfing their guts out while little old ladies with their knitting walked by unscathed.

I hope the rest of your trip in your classic car went well – but I suspect there were challenges.

Cargo damage from roll-overs varies widely. The biggest problem we had was that we hauled temperature controlled fish, meat produce, etc. If the outside temperatures were close to the load temp (i.e. roll over a load of frozen in February when it is -20 or a load of lettuce in the spring when it is 35-45 F ) some loads came through amazingly well. You might not believe the following but it is 100% true – I swear. I was headed to Boston one day when dispatch called and asked me to check on a new driver who had rolled over a load of lettuce when he entered a rest area and the ramp was black ice. The truck rolled softly but had too much damage to continue so they transferred the lettuce (in 40 pound cases) to a second company truck. I went to Boston unloaded and reloaded and was headed back when the office called again. The same load (on the second truck) had rolled over on a rural road (The Airline we called it) when the driver stalled on a steep hill and the truck rolled backwards and down over the bank. It was on its side and they transferred the load to a third truck – one case at a time. The third driver fell asleep that night on a large mountain only 60 miles from his destination and drove off the road and rolled over in a field in the side of the mountain. They transferred the load of lettuce to a fourth truck and according to the office, when I asked, the load was received and signed for in good condition by the customer. Ha!

I had never before and have never since heard of such a tale and I can verify that it is true because I knew all the divers and was at two of the three accidents. Unreal ,eh?

Barbara, I can’t stop laughing about your escapades getting to Spain with the sainted canine! Showing this one to all my friends who indeed have anthropomorphism do their dogs and who indeed do have astroturfed balconies!!

I’m pleased it’s not just me that jumped for joy at the thought of a grownup holiday, deliriously excited about how cheap it would be with just the two of us only to find it wasn’t!! My expectations for what makes up a decent time away seem to have risen from the time BC when a studio apt, which meant sleeping on not much more than a pull out bench seat was all I needed. 🙂 Terrific tale Barb – looking forward to more!

I think the thing I love the most about grownup vacations is that I don’t have to make everyone (or even anyone besides me) happy. I have a picture of the first time we took the kids to Paris—the four of them huddled in exhausted disgust on a bench in the Louvre, wondering if their torture would ever end.

I enjoy learning about how people road trip in other countries. Road tripping throughout the U.S. is an adventure – love to do it in a foreign land. Nothing better than heading out and hitting the road!

Except… here I’m driving a UK car on EU roads, so it’s a stick-shift with the steering wheel on the wrong side. I spend each trip telling myself to drive on the right, but the roundabouts are SO terrifying—I’m absolutely convinced I’m going the wrong way.

I totally did not think about that and then a stick shift. I would be stopped in the middle of the road just bawling – ha! When we were in Ireland we could not figure out why we were sore after one day of riding in a van – then we realized we were getting in and out differently and the seat belts were different too – using muscles that we did not know exist.

WHERE DID NULL CITY BOOKS GO?

I've split with my publisher, so books 1-4 are getting a makeover in time for the release of OPEN FARE, the final NULL CITY book. If you'd like to join the Beta Reader team, please send email (barbtaub (at) gmail (dot) com. I'll send you my undying thanks plus advanced readers copies of all books, including the upcoming OPEN FARE.